The Poisoned Chalice?

All advertisments are hidden for logged in members, why not log in/register?


Just wrote a small piece about how past managers have fared since leaving United. This is on the back of the debate of whether we sack too many managers or whether the issue is we simply appoint poor managers that are never going to take us where we want to be

https://roysviewfrom.wordpress.com/2015/05/25/the-poisoned-chalice/

Glad you did that Roy. Yes, we've appointed from a position of really not having good antennae. Does it all return to McCabe or his fellow directors? Or have we just been unlucky in the (lack of) quality we've attracted? I must admit, when we appointed Speed my hopes were (momentarily) raised. Don't ask why, maybe because I assumed (possibly incorrectly) that he'd know a decent player when he saw one and be able to attract them to United. The days when we could select a Mcgrath, or Cowans, or......seem long gone, so who we have as manager may reflect this trend too. I hope not. We're a potentially good sized club who could achieve just as much as a Stoke, WBA, Palace or Swansea, but maybe the Prince will provide that edge we've missed.....time will tell.
 
What got me thinking about this was the arguments about how we can't continue to sack managers. I agree that we shouldn't be chopping and changing every year but at the same time there isn't one manager since Warnock left that I wish we still had. I don't think the issue is sacking managers . I think it's appointing poor ones in the first place. Other than Speed (and maybe Adams but at a lower level then we are now) not one of the managers since Warnock has ended up having any real success elsewhere. For me this is because they aren't good managers. It wasn't necessarily wrong to sack any of the managers but it was wrong to appoint them in the first place.
 
We only go for available managers which by definition means unemployed which generally means recently sacked. There aren't many who will drop down from a higher level although it still remains an excellent opportunity with a big club, even if they will only get a year !
 
Good article, only quibble is that I can't remember it being a shock to anyone that Adams got the boot.

Maybe you are right there. I just recall him talking about next season and what he was gonna do. I just presumed it was sure he was staying on
 
It's not who you fire it's who you hire that has been the problem for us, when you hire shit you very quickly need to get rid of them and looking over the past managers since Warnock boy have we hired some right shit. Almost all to a man have done nothing since we got rid of them.
 
It's not who you fire it's who you hire that has been the problem for us, when you hire shit you very quickly need to get rid of them and looking over the past managers since Warnock boy have we hired some right shit. Almost all to a man have done nothing since we got rid of them.

Warnock was lucky it wasn't as cut throat 10 years ago because there's no doubt he wouldn't have survived to take us up.
 
We only go for available managers which by definition means unemployed which generally means recently sacked. There aren't many who will drop down from a higher level although it still remains an excellent opportunity with a big club, even if they will only get a year !
Another good point. However, there's a gulf between the odds you'd expect from employing Nigel Adkins and Nigel Clough. It's in the track record.

There are some very good managers sacked because of irrational expectation. I don't think that's the case with Clough. I do think that's the case with Adkins.

UTB
 
Cracking new photo Ken. See you've changed your hairstyle, sure it'll grow on me. It obviously has on you.
It's so I can ditch the red carnation when attending clandestine meetings, Blood.

It's a metaphor for my faith and hope when it comes to all things Blades and also how I feel during a 5 year long stay in the third division. You can see me just peering over the parapet, accepting mediocrity, since I have no divine right, being a Blade, to expect anything more.
 
It's so I can ditch the red carnation when attending clandestine meetings, Blood.

It's a metaphor for my faith and hope when it comes to all things Blades and also how I feel during a 5 year long stay in the third division. You can see me just peering over the parapet, accepting mediocrity, since I have no divine right, being a Blade, to expect anything more.

Yes, the fact that you and I are reduced to metaphor in order to demonstrate our support means we've gradually been worn down, but I doubt neither you or I have lost that inner belief that we deserve so much better. Don't know what metaphor I'd select to express how I feel. A lame cock (on second thoughts that would get me an infraction)? Looking out from behind prison bars? Being that bloke who slept on the train and missed his stop? The list is endless. Whoever came up with dedicating ourselves to one club for life was a right deviant prophet.
 

Another good point. However, there's a gulf between the odds you'd expect from employing Nigel Adkins and Nigel Clough. It's in the track record.

There are some very good managers sacked because of irrational expectation. I don't think that's the case with Clough. I do think that's the case with Adkins.

UTB

Yes, you can go back to when Charlton (or the fans) got rid of Curbishley, not happy with mid table in the Premiership. This is why I think it's still an attractive job for a 'bigger name' manager as the potential is, dare I say, massive here. OK, they may be on a season contract but they will have the tools to do the job.
 
Yes, the fact that you and I are reduced to metaphor in order to demonstrate our support means we've gradually been worn down, but I doubt neither you or I have lost that inner belief that we deserve so much better. Don't know what metaphor I'd select to express how I feel. A lame cock (on second thoughts that would get me an infraction)? Looking out from behind prison bars? Being that bloke who slept on the train and missed his stop? The list is endless. Whoever came up with dedicating ourselves to one club for life was a right deviant prophet.
Here's a couple of options for you, Itsers
Surprised Plank.PNG Blue Footed Booby.jpg

A surprised bit of wood and a blue footed Boobie
Metaphors and euphemisms at the same time - genius!
 
Yes, you can go back to when Charlton (or the fans) got rid of Curbishley, not happy with mid table in the Premiership. This is why I think it's still an attractive job for a 'bigger name' manager as the potential is, dare I say, massive here. OK, they may be on a season contract but they will have the tools to do the job.

Funny you should mention Charlton Jim. I once knew a Charlton fan, he was very objective about their chances of remaining in the old First Division. Quite rightly, he identified fans being spoon fed success in the Second Division, expecting the same ratio of wins once they got promoted to the First, but as he predicted, they suffered a major hangover once they entered the old First. Since then they've probably found their level, mostly because they don't have a moneybags behind them.
The one ray of joy was their temporary signing of Allan Simonsen, ex-Barcelona and European Player Of The Year. A great Danish player who I saw a few times, he lit up Charlton, but unfortunately they couldn't continue to pay his wages and the remainder of his fee, so he returned to Denmark to see out his career.

But back to your point about Charlton parting company with Curbishley. Yes, over-expectation made the club adopt unrealistic ambitions, when they should have focussed on consolidation and strengthening their squad. Probably a lesson for those teams who gain promotion and need to cut their cloth in order to survive.
 
Yes, you can go back to when Charlton (or the fans) got rid of Curbishley, not happy with mid table in the Premiership. This is why I think it's still an attractive job for a 'bigger name' manager as the potential is, dare I say, massive here. OK, they may be on a season contract but they will have the tools to do the job.
Yeah that backfired on the charlton fans. Thought it would happen to stoke when they wanted pulis out but to be fair Hughes has done well.

We messed up getting rid of warnock when we did. He was the perfect man to get us back up. Same with Wolves and McCarthy.
 
I think our managers since Warnock can be put in one of two categories: doing alright and sacked too soon (Blackwell, Wilson, Clough), or an utterly dreadful appointment (Robson, Adams, Weir). The exception is Speed whose tenure was too short to gauge how he would have fared in the long term (probably would have been sacked too soon).

The problem is we are missing a third category: taking the club forward and getting poached from higher up the food chain. That has to be the target for the board, but whether they don't have the ability to identify a candidate in that category and land him or there isn't a suitable candidate willing to come to SUFC I'm not sure.

Ideally we would bring in someone who will take us up two levels over five years, but that is a big ask for the board to get right. Given the men they have appointed, they pulled the trigger too quickly on Blackwell, Wilson and Clough, and at a fairly stupid time in each case. They aren't learning from this mistake, and again we are looking for a miracle worker and again we are playing catch up over summer recruitment on the playing staff.

I sincerely hope the board have something up their sleeve and they can prove they have finally made a good decision in disposing of Clough. I'm not holding my breath.
 
Confirms what I've said for ages, and what I said when many were getting over excited about Clough's appointment. We appoint shit managers. We don't sack them too soon.

UTB

I'd argue for the case of a couple of them as you probably know (Wilson being incredibly unlucky) but you can't argue with the fact that what we recruit is the law of diminishing returns. Who next though, because surely we can't look much lower right now.

People need to get it out of their head this is a great job for top managers. We fire them every 12 or so months and their career generally spirals downhill from there. Not what I would want on my CV.
 
Yes, you can go back to when Charlton (or the fans) got rid of Curbishley, not happy with mid table in the Premiership. This is why I think it's still an attractive job for a 'bigger name' manager as the potential is, dare I say, massive here. OK, they may be on a season contract but they will have the tools to do the job.

Indeed you can go back to that but they bounced back so much quicker because they stopped making the same mistakes. We just keep circling the toilet bowl of crap decisions (of which I believe we have made another one just the other day) and compounding poor sackings with even poorer appointments. The fact Morgan could be in the frame says enough about our situation for me.
 
I'd argue for the case of a couple of them as you probably know (Wilson being incredibly unlucky) but you can't argue with the fact that what we recruit is the law of diminishing returns. Who next though, because surely we can't look much lower right now.

People need to get it out of their head this is a great job for top managers. We fire them every 12 or so months and their career generally spirals downhill from there. Not what I would want on my CV.
Unfortunately, a lot of the bad luck our manager's experience is engineered by the board. Ched's departure and Miller's season ending Injury notwithstanding Wilson had Blackman sold soon after losing Miller and was sacked with 5 games to go, 6 points of automatic and no credible replacement in sight. Blackwell got them from near bottom to near play offs in half the time it took Clough - admittedly less points required - and got them to a play off final. Sacked 3 games in to next season.
Set in this context Clough's sacking is not unreasonable and in my view timely unlike those above.
 
As others have said, it's not the fans fault that we keep getting landed with crap managers. Clough had absolutely everything in his favour to bring success to the Lane. That he failed was entirely in keeping with his career as a manager. And that might be the formula for a (hopefully) good manager. Forget people like Clough - or Stuart Pearce or Alan Shearer. They've made their money and are no longer hungry. Slaviša Jokanović, anybody?
 
Unfortunately, a lot of the bad luck our manager's experience is engineered by the board. Ched's departure and Miller's season ending Injury notwithstanding Wilson had Blackman sold soon after losing Miller and was sacked with 5 games to go, 6 points of automatic and no credible replacement in sight. Blackwell got them from near bottom to near play offs in half the time it took Clough - admittedly less points required - and got them to a play off final. Sacked 3 games in to next season.
Set in this context Clough's sacking is not unreasonable and in my view timely unlike those above.

Blackwell had another full season in which we missed the play-offs before he was sacked.
 
Blackwell had another full season in which we missed the play-offs before he was sacked.
Fair point. What I was getting at was the ill-timing of the Blackwell and Wilson sackings and that Clough's saviour act was not so extraordinary.
 
What is also surprising is how long it takes them to appoint each shit manager. We must be the slowest moving team in the history of football. With the seemingly fairly ruthless decision to bin Clough you got the impression they had someone lined up. Not a massive trawl of average northern managers...
 

All advertisments are hidden for logged in members, why not log in/register?

All advertisments are hidden for logged in members, why not log in/register?

Back
Top Bottom